Farmers to be trained in new jute rotting technique

05 Jul '10

2 min read

Agriculture Minister, Matia Chowdhury, recently at a press conference at her ministry passed on the assurance that, each and every of the 1.5 million jute farmers in the country, will be imparted training in ribbon retting, a mode of rotting jute with less quantity of water, and they will also be provided financial assistance of Tk 200.

She stated that, a ribbon-retting machine will be provided per 100 farmers so that, the farmers with the help of this latest technology can process the jute plants at a higher speed than earlier.

The Agriculture Ministry has already bought 15,000 machines for distributing it to the farmers, and the ministry officials will be imparting training to the farmers as regards usage of these machines, she said. The Ministry has already spent Tk 370 million for the purpose, Chowdhury said.

Conventionally, farmers detach fibre from jute, after retting the jute plants into water for around two to three weeks, but now, with the ribbon-retting technology, they will have to first skin the fibre first and then place them in water containers for retting.

It has been decided to extend financial assistance to farmers from 28 regions of Faridpur, Madaripur, Gopalganj, Rajshahi, Naogaon, Sirajganj, Mymensingh, Rangpur, Gaibandha, Dinajpur and Tangail, where sizeable amount of jute is produced.

The measures were initiated, as the farmers, now followed by mounting demands in local as well as overseas markets, are reaping higher returns, but are confronting difficulties in jute rotting with scarce waters in the canals or marshy lands.

At present, raw jute is being traded at Tk 1,800 – 2,400 per maund in the local markets, as against Tk 1,000-1,400 for which it was best traded during the season last year.

Quality of the fibre will also get better with introduction of this new technology, Matia said but added that, this economical ribbon-retting technology is not yet accessible by the farmers.

She was very much positive on that, just as the farmers get acquainted with this new technique and it could be extensively made use of to address the problem of water scarcity.

Fibre2Fashion News Desk - India

More Textiles News - Bangladesh...